In Other News…

• The National Bank of Romania has issued a new 20 lei banknote. It is intended to fill the gap between the 10 and 50 lei notes, and to honour a woman for the first time on a circulating note – Ecaterina Teodoroiu, a heroine of World War I.

In common with the other Romanian notes, the 20 lei is produced on GUARDIAN® polymer and printed by the state printworks. It features a complex window design, with a gold METALIX™ trumpet, a Shadow Image featuring the portrait and the BNR logo, a MAGREAD™ thread and, on the reverse, an IRISwitch™ stripe.

Coinciding with the launch of the new 20 lei, the Bank has also produced a limited edition polymer replica of the 20 lei of 1881 for the collectors market. This note contains two windows in place of the watermarks in the original – both printed with CCL’s VIVID™ Colour.

• The Bank of Mauritius has upgraded its Rs25 and Rs50 polymer banknotes with the incorporation of Gemini™, a dual fluorescent feature visible under UV light from De La Rue. The notes were first issued in 2013, and both versions will co-circulate.

• A new series of banknotes is on the cards for Indonesia for 2022. Although not officially confirmed, the country’s Social Minister along with officials from Bank Indonesia are reported to have visited the families of Indonesia’s first President and Vice President to seek their approval for their forebears’ portraits to feature on the notes.

• The Central Bank of Nicaragua (BCN) has announced improvements to the 10 and 20 cordobas notes, which were issued in 2015.

Both have a new tactile element for the visually impaired, comprising raised dots to indicate the denominations. Both also feature an iridescent band on the reverse – comprising images of palm trees and the number 10 on the 10 cordobas, and images of seaweed and the number 20 on the 20 cordobas.

• The National Bank of Poland has issued a collector’s banknote with a face value of 20 złoty commemorating Prof Lech Kaczyński, former President of the Republic of Poland, with the title ‘It is Worth Being a Pole’.

Prof Kaczyński was president from 2005 to 2010, when he died in plane crash along with 95 others, including senior government and military officials, en route to a ceremony in Smolensk, Russia to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Katyn massacre.

80,000 notes have been printed by PWPW. The front features a portrait of Prof Kaczyński, an image of the Order of the White Eagle, and an image of the Presidential Palace in Warsaw. On the back is an image of the Warsaw Rising Museum, a crowd of strikers from the trade union movement Solidarity in the Gdańsk shipyard in the 1980s which was instrumental in bringing about the end of Communist rule, and a view of the Polish War Cemetery in Katyń.

Security features include a two-coloured optically variable windowed thread and SPARK® Live.

• De La Rue has produced a limited edition £20 for the RBS, one of COP26’s sponsors as well as one of Scotland’s three note issuing banknotes, with some help from local schoolchildren.

Students from a primary school in Edinburgh took part in an RBS handwriting competition focused on the arrival of the global event to Scotland. The winning note features the words ‘together for our planet’ and was showcased to delegates and world leaders over the course of the climate summit.

The £20 is RBS’ highest circulating banknote with more than £700 million currently in circulation, but only 350 COP26 commemorative notes were produced.

• The Central Bank of Azerbaijan has unveiled the design for its new 20 manat note, which is part of an upgrade that has already seen new 1, 5 and 50 manat notes issued earlier this year. The 20 manat will go into circulation next year. The remaining denominations – the 10 and 100 manats – will follow.

• The Royal Canada Mint (RCM) has issued a new 10 cent (dime) coin that celebrates the 100th anniversary of the Bluenose, in its time the fastest fishing vessel in the world. 6 million coloured versions and 9 million uncoloured version have been minted. The former, described as a ‘groundbreaking first for a 10 cent circulating coin’, are coloured blue to highlight the deep waters of the North Atlantic.

The Bluenose first appeared on the dime in 1937. This is the first time it has been redesigned since then. The coins are also double-dated ‘1921-2021’ in recognition of the anniversary.

Separately, the RCM has announced the launch of Mental Health Medal, in recognition of the heavy toll on the mental health of people across Canada due to the pandemic. All net proceeds from the sale of each medal will go directly to Kids Help Phone, a charity that develops mental health programs supporting young people in Canada and adult carers.

• The Reserve Bank of Malawi has unveiled a new high denomination 5,000 kwacha banknote, along with an upgraded 2,000 kwacha. They will go into circulation next February.

According to RBM Governor Wilson Banda, as per currency management policies, the high banknote in the economy should not account for more than 60% of the total value of currency in circulation but, as it stands, the 2,000 kwacha exceeds 80%. The introduction of the 5,000 kwacha will result in fewer notes needed in transactions, and also serve as a store of value note, relieving pressure on the 2,000.

The 5,000 will feature a portrait of former President Hastings Banda, who also appears on the 1,000. The design of the 2,000, which was issued in 2016, will remain broadly the same, but with enhanced security features. It already features a diffractive stripe and SPARK® Live on the front and a RollingStar® thread on the reverse.

At the same time as unveiling the new notes, the Governor announced that some of the country’s banknotes, presumably the low denomination ones, will be converted to coins.

• The Bank of China in Hong Kong has announced that it will issue 2 million HK$20 banknotes to commemorate the Beijing XXIV Winter Olympics. Prices range from HK$138 for a single note to HK$1,388 for 35 notes in an uncut sheet. All proceeds will go to charity.

The Bank of China’s Macau branch, meanwhile, will issue a commemorative 20 patacas note. The front will feature the emblem of the Games and the Macau branch building. The reverse will show short track speed skaters and the National Speed Skating Oval built for the Winter Olympics.

• The National Bank of Ukraine has released two new commemorative banknotes to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Ukraine’s independence. The 20 and 200 hryvnia are the same in design as the existing circulating versions, but have a stylised 30 on the front to mark the anniversary. 30,000 of each have been printed.

• Japan has begun issuing newly redesigned ¥500 coins for the first time in 21 years. While the new coins do not differ substantially from the previous design, they are two-coloured in a tri-metal structure and feature etchings on the inner rim as part of efforts to prevent counterfeiting.

The Finance Ministry plans to mint 200 million of the new coins by the end of the fiscal year in March, although the c. 5 billion ¥500 coins currently in circulation will still be usable.

• The Central Bank of Liberia (CBL) has confirmed that it will start the introduction of the new Liberian dollar series with the L$100 this December. An initial L$4 billion will be issued to provide liquidity during the upcoming festive season. A second consignment to the same value will be issued in the first quarter of 2022.

The new L$100 is part of the L$48.7 billion of the new family of currency authorised by the national legislature in May to be printed, and minted in 2021, 2022 and 2024.

The introduction of the remaining L$100 banknotes and other denominations – including the L$20, L$50, L$500 and L$1,000 banknotes, and the L$5 and L$10 coins – is due to take place in the latter half of 2022.